Written by Todd
Komarnicki, based on “Highest Duty” by Chesley Sullenberger and Jeffrey Zaslow.

Directed by Clint
Eastwood.

GRADE: A-

REVIEW:

Hero worship is often a slippery slope, ending in
disillusionment. Too many times, the folks we prop up as protagonists turn out
to be human, after all, quickly transporting us from our happy places to
disenchanting slums of disgust. It’s a rare treat when a real-life hero weathers
the torrents of second-guessing, pessimism and ridicule to emerge unscathed.
One such person is Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger, the U.S. Airways pilot who
successfully ditched and Airbus A320 into the Hudson River after the plane hit
a flock of geese in January 2009. His story is the subject of Clint Eastwood’s Sully.

Tom Hanks plays the title character, supported by Aaron
Eckhart, who plays co-pilot Jeff Skiles. The film unfolds in a series of
flashbacks of the incident in which the plane loses both engines after striking
the birds and the pilots maneuver the aircraft until their only option is to
try a water landing. Spoiler alert: All 155 people on board U.S. Airways Flight
1549 survive, as Sully and his crew are hailed as heroes.

Not so fast. There has to be a little more conflict than a
few irksome geese in a Hollywood movie, so screenwriter Todd Komarnicki
embellished a few nasty NTSB investigators (Mike O’Malley, Anna Gunn and Jamey
Sheridan) to antagonize Sully and paint him as an errant pilot. The investigation
becomes the point of conflict, not the incident itself, as Sully, his wife
(Laura Linney) and the survivors support the hero in the face of all that
misplaced suspicion. The meany investigators insist that Sully could have
landed plane at not one, but two nearby airports instead of making the water
landing, leaving our hero’s future and credibility in doubt, and killing the buzz of a true feel-good experience. The foul nature of
the investigation leads to a climactic scene in which Sully reminds those wicked
bureaucrats about the human element of any pending catastrophe.

Manufactured conflict aside (the real NTSB investigators are
not pleased with their demonization in the movie), Sully is a very good film that depicts a true act of heroism and
courage in the face of incredible odds. Tom Hanks once again transforms himself
into the everyman hero we’ve all come to enjoy on screen, perfectly portraying
the humble, reluctant victor. Clint Eastwood’s cinematic craftsmanship seems
perfect for a movie that spends most of its time in the minutiae of governmental
oversight, while drawing out some very tender emotions regarding the worth of
souls and the delicate balance between doom and triumph.

Captain Sullenberger and his crew really did pull off an
unprecedented miracle that freezing January afternoon, and Sully doesn’t do anything to tarnish that reality.